Another Pound Gone; Why Is The FastDiet So Easy?
Mar 25, 2013 Weight Loss
So I’ve lost another pound on the FastDiet. Well, 8/10 of a pound to be precise, but I’ll just call it a pound. I promise if I lose 1.2 pounds next week I’ll call that a pound to even things out. That’s seven pounds overall in three weeks!
It’s almost 2:30pm and today is another fasting day, which means I only eat 500 calories. I felt like I needed to sit down and write this post right now, as I’m feeling this, because otherwise you wouldn’t believe me – you would think that I was misremembering.
So, hear me now: I haven’t eaten yet today, and I feel great. I exercised this morning – 23 minutes of cardio and some weights – and I felt great during that too.
The thing is, most people don’t believe that they would be able to handle the fasting days. They claim that they would faint (I have never felt faint on this eating plan, not even a little bit! That would be scary and dangerous). Or, that they would be able to do it until dinner time and then would eat everything they could get their hands on. Or, that they would eat so much on the non-fasting days to make up for it, they would end up gaining weight. All I can say is, try it.
Yes, the first time or two may be tough, but they get so much easier.
So, the reasonable follow-up question from the skeptics would be, “If you’re able to show SO much discipline and wait to eat and control your food intake this well on the fasting days, why can’t you just control yourself every day and eat less without doing something as extreme as the FastDiet?”
Well, the key is that I only have to show will power two days a week. I can do anything two days a week. It is – honest to God – easy to do this today knowing that I won’t have to worry about it again until Thursday. And I have not found that I’m eating more on the “off” days – I’m eating less.
On the other hand, the last time I tried to just “eat right” and “be good” and exercise I gained twenty-five pounds.
This really feels like something I could do long-term.
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, I’ve written about the FastDiet (and the other things I’ve been doing along with it) each week I’ve been on it:
A Great First Week on the FastDiet
FastDiet Update: A More Reasonable Loss
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: FastDiet, Weight Loss
Putting My Money Where My Ass Is
Mar 19, 2013 Weight Loss
I’ve been nibbling around the edges of being a runner for too long. For three years now I’ve signed up for the Disney Princess Half Marathon, and all three years I finished it using a combination of jogging and walking. And while I’m proud of that, I would like to run more of it. I am proud of what I’ve done, but it’s getting old.
The first two years I didn’t do much training. I would say I was going to, and then cold weather would hit and that plan would go out the window. This past year I did better: in the twenty weeks before the race, I averaged about 1.5 training sessions a week. And while that was nowhere near the 4 sessions my plan called for, it was still more than I had ever done. And while it was great to get through the race easier and not be in pain the next day, I was still really really slow.
Part of this is my weight. I simply have to take off some serious poundage before I can get much faster, and I’m working on that. But the other part is that I have to think about running as a year-round activity, not something I try to do each year just for the Princess Half.
I can put myself on any kind of schedule I want, I can say I’m going to do whatever. But the only thing that actually makes me do what I’ve said is to officially sign up for something. So, after pouring through the upcoming races in NYC for the rest of the year, I signed up for two: a 5K race in May, and a 10k in October. Signed up, paid for, committed to, as good as done.
The best part is, I train for the 5k when NYC isn’t beastly hot yet, and most of my 10k training will happen as we’re cooling down for fall. I’ll still have to train in the cold weather for the Princess Half in February, but I need to suck it up and just do it. I started yesterday by going for a run/walk in hail and freezing rain, and I didn’t die. In fact, I felt good. It felt good. To just get out there in conditions that weren’t ideal and say “screw it.”
So, the gauntlet has been thrown down – even if the only person I’m challenging is myself.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: exercise, Princess Half, running, Weight Loss
FastDiet Update: A More Reasonable Loss
Mar 18, 2013 Weight Loss
I’ve discovered a few things during these two weeks. One, keeping busy on fasting days is key. If I have nothing to do, I fill that time dreaming about food. I guess that’s true whether I’m fasting or not, but it matters even more now.
Two, proximity to food is also important. I work upstairs until I’m able to have my first meal. Being out of the house also works. You’d think that running errands – passing by restaurant after restaurant – would make it tough, but for me it doesn’t. It’s the fresh bread on my counter that tempts me, not the pizza on the corner. I don’t really know why.
Three, the longer I wait to eat on a fasting day, the happier I am. Before I’ve had anything to eat, hunger is just a dull thing in the back of my mind. But once I start eating, it moves right to the front – I start planning my snack and dinner, thinking about how long until I get to eat next. It’s almost 2pm right now and I haven’t eaten yet – it gets easier the later it gets. Once I have “breakfast” – probably right after I post this – I won’t have to wait long for a snack, and then I’ll probably have dinner early, around 6pm. In fact, I’m not quite there yet, but I can totally see why a lot of people on this plan just fast all day and then use all of their calories for a big dinner.
The best part is, I’m now closer to only thinking about this two days a week. For the first week, whenever I was eating, my brain was saying things like “Enjoy this, your next fast day is in two days!” “Enjoy this, your next fast day is tomorrow!” I was obsessing over the fast days even on the other days. I’m pretty much over that now, which makes all of this so much easier. And not having to measure or weigh anything the other five days – after years and years of counting calories – is complete bliss.
Now, to add exercise back. After the Princess Half was over I was eager to get into some non-running exercise, but once I started this fasting thing I decided to wait. I tend to dive into things and overdo them, so I gave myself a couple weeks off from exercise so that I wouldn’t overwhelm myself. But now that I seem to be into this fasting groove, I’m ready to get moving again.
And while I said I was going to leave jogging for a while until I lost a little weight, I just might go for a jog today while my daughter is at dance class. That would be better than sitting in a waiting room full of screaming toddlers, each one eating something. Although, this being Brooklyn, a lot of them have kale chips or Veggie Booty, which does not tempt me in the least. :-)
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: exercise, FastDiet, fasting, Weight Loss
A Great First Week On The FastDiet
Mar 10, 2013 Weight Loss
So, I’m always reluctant to report on 1st week weight loss w/a new plan. I know it’s not indicative of what’s to come. But…5lbs. #FastDay
— SelfishMom (@SelfishMom) March 10, 2013
I tweeted that this morning. I’d weighed myself first thing, but wasn’t going to make it public, because I think it gives people a false sense of what realistic weight loss is. The first week I start a new eating plan I always lose a bunch of weight. I eat less salt, I drink more water, and all of the fluid my body has been holding on to floods out. So, of the five pounds I lost over the last six days (OK, technically 4.8), how much of it was water? I have no idea. I’d be happy to be able to sustain a loss of one pound per week. I’d be ecstatic at two pounds. But at the very least, seeing the scale move that much in one week is motivating. So I decided to make it public. I’m sure that next week’s results will be a much better gauge of what will happen long-term.
Eating only 500 calories two days a week, based on this book, was responsible for most of the actual weight loss. The first fast day was tough. While I felt very good physically, I spent all day thinking about the food I wasn’t eating. Oddly enough, the second fast day was the opposite: for most of the day I wasn’t hungry and didn’t really think about food much, but I had a headache and a weird feeling in my stomach. I ended the day with a giant plate of sautéed veggies with Parmesan and a small Kit Kat though, and all was right with the world. (I came down with a really bad cold the next day and, in retrospect, that was probably responsible for my weird feeling and headache.) Curious how my third fast day will go tomorrow. According to the book, they get easier and easier the longer you do them.
So what else am I doing? Last week I went into the main part of my new plan a little bit, but I also mentioned that I was doing other things. Here’s my entire plan. And as usual, this is working for me, I’m not a doctor, I’m not saying any of this is safe, do at your own risk, consult your own doctor, yada yada yada.
Two Days a Week:
I eat 500 calories a day, between noon and 8pm. I find that once I start eating I want to eat more, so waiting to eat until noon is actually a bit easier for me. The book also indicates that the longer you wait to eat on fast days, the more benefit you get. The benefits of fasting don’t really kick in until you’ve gone without food for at least ten hours, so the longer you can wait to eat on that fast day, the better.
Five Days a Week:
I don’t start eating until twelve hours after I finished eating the night before. I’ve basically restricted eating to between 8am and 8pm. Since I get up at six on weekdays, this has been a little annoying, but has basically eliminated one meal a day – I used to sometimes eat breakfast with my son and then again a couple hours later with my daughter. Additionally it encourages me to stop eating at a reasonable time at night, since I know I don’t want to delay breakfast the next day.
Finish breakfast with a chocolate-based dessert. This one has some good science behind it. I’d tried it before, but combined with calorie counting it caused me to use up too many calories early in the day. Now I’m no longer making it part of a 600 calorie breakfast, just adding it my normal breakfast – say, an English muffin with butter and half a cupcake, or half of an egg-and-cheese bagel and a Kit Kat. This one is hard to quantify, but I think I’ve been finding it easier not to overeat at dinner. And I love having dessert so early. It’s also worth noting that not once was I tempted to have a second dessert later.
I eat an apple and a salad. Why? Because even though I really enjoy apples and salads, I would never ever choose them over, say, a bag of potato chips, unless of course I had some kind of external rule telling me I have to. This is just how my brain works. So, by requiring myself to eat an apple and a salad each day, I’m probably giving up something that would be much worse for me. Banning foods would just make me want them more, so this is a sneakier way of eating healthy. By the way, for the salad, I’ve put no restrictions on it. It can be big, small, full of blue cheese dressing, in place of a meal, or as a snack. So far they’ve all been Greek salads, because that’s what I like.
Every Day:
Get at least eight hours of sleep. Many studies have shown that people who get enough sleep tend to weigh less. Whether that’s because thin people make better choices, or sleep actually aids in weight loss, or not being exhausted helps you make better eating choices, I have no idea. But there’s really no downside to getting enough sleep.
Drink 40 ounces of water. For most people this would just be automatic, but I really really hate water. I hate it with lemon in it, I hate it all the other ways people tell me I’ll like it. And while 40 ounces isn’t a huge amount, it’s enough to make me feel like I’m not dehydrated.
Take Fucothin three times a day. Fucothin is a seaweed supplement recommended by Dr. Oz. Trials of the active ingredient – fucoxanthin – found up to a 23% increase in metabolism, despite the fact that fucoxanthin is not a stimulant and caused no adverse side effects in test subjects. The downside is that it takes anywhere from five to sixteen weeks to build up in your system before you’ll see any benefit, so this one is definitely not contributing to my weight loss yet. However, now that I’m forty, my metabolism needs all the boosting it can get. I’m taking one Fucothin three times a day, and am going to work up to taking three of them three times a day. Considering also taking the other two supplements recommended by Dr. Oz. I trust him.
Get hungry, and stop eating when full!!! Doing the opposite of this is how I got this way in the first place. I like to eat as soon as I feel even a tiny bit hungry, and I don’t stop until I’m past full, all the way to stuffed. I’m happy to say that thanks to the combination of things I did this week, I didn’t overeat at all. Not once. That’s a big deal for me.
I definitely ate less this week on the non-fast days. I wasn’t keeping track (which is the whole point), but I could just tell. Was it because of the dessert-for-breakfast thing? Was I filling myself up with water and apples and salads? Was I just so happy to be able to eat more than 500 calories that I didn’t need as much as usual? Did my stomach actually shrink on the fast days? No idea. But whatever it was, so far so good.
I’ve lost weight before. The key is to see how long I can keep this up. Week two, here I come!
Some additional articles on intermittent fasting you might find helpful:
Depriving Yourself: The Real Benefits Of Fasting
Intermittent Fasting: A Healthy Choice
The 5:2 Diet: Can It Help You Lose Weight And Live Longer?
The Benefits Of Occasional Fasting
The Power Of Intermittent Fasting
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: Weight Loss
Diary Of A Faster, Day 1
Mar 5, 2013 Weight Loss, What's Going On
Yesterday I started a new eating plan. I looked at everything I’ve done in the past year or so that worked. My most successful weight loss plan was the one where I ate very low carb/low cal two days a week, moderately four days a week, and whatever I wanted one day a week. So if it was so successful, why did I quit? The constant calorie counting. The amount of food was doable, but counting every calorie – especially when cooking a lot – gets old really fast.
But then on Sunday, I read a book that I’d seen on GMA a few days before, The FastDiet (it really did take just part of one day – there isn’t enough in there for a whole book so it’s beefed up with menu plans, calorie lists and testimonials, but the information is good). And I decided to try the two-day-a-week low calorie aspect of what had worked for me, without the low carb part and – most importantly – without counting any calories the other five days.
I’m doing some other small things too (I’ll go into them in a future post), but this is the cornerstone of my new plan: 500 calories on Mondays and Thursdays, whatever on the other days. 500 calories is not a lot. But the way my brain works, I suspect it will be easier to torture myself for two days every week than to try to be moderate and keep track the majority of the time. We’ll see. Because finding a way to lose weight is pretty easy – I’ve found probably half a dozen that worked for me. But if they’re not sustainable, they’re pretty pointless.
So, how did my first “fast day” go? Inspired by Stimey’s quest to give up Diet Coke, I kept a diary. (But don’t expect me to give up Diet Dr Pepper any time soon – as you can see, it’s pretty much the only thing that got me through the fast day!) I’m restricting my eating on the fast days to between noon and 8pm – again, I’ll go into why in a future blog post.
6:05am: Jake wakes me up. My first thought is “Damn, I can’t just start eating when I get downstairs.” I am sad.
6:15am: Make Jake’s lunch. Wonder why the hell I made fresh bread last night knowing I couldn’t have any this morning. It smells sooooooo good. Stupid stupid stupid. Do not lick the knife after making Jake’s peanut butter sandwich. Harder than child birth. Drink a Diet Dr Pepper.
6:45am: Send Jake off to school and climb under the covers for another hour of sleep. Growling stomach keeps me awake. WTF, stomach? Half the time I don’t eat breakfast before eating with Fiona at 8, so are you just doing this because you know it’s a fast day? Not fair!
8am: Have The Ass take my fasting blood glucose level with a little thing that stabs your finger. It takes him THREE freaking tries. Immediately want to eat a bag of salt and vinegar potato chips.
8:45am: Drop Fiona off at school and go to the store for apples, strawberries, and hummus. Nix the white bean hummus because it’s 20 calories more per serving. When you only have 500 calories to work with, every one counts. Thank God I only have to worry about this twice a week.
9:29am: Finish my second Diet Dr Pepper of the day. Wish I could say that it’s because of the fasting, but this is normal. Tell myself I’ll have water next.
9:32am: Open a third Diet Dr Pepper.
9:40am: Open fridge and stare longingly at the cottage cheese. Not the leftover baked ziti, not the giant hunk of blue cheese, but the cottage cheese. Probably because I know I can have some later, as opposed to the other foods which will have to wait until tomorrow. So, not total torture. Just a delay.
9:45am: Boil a couple of eggs in case I want them later. Thinking egg salad maybe.
10am: Drink a glass of water. Wonder why the hell I don’t like water infused with lemon or rose petals or whatever other stupid things people are always telling me to put in water.
10:02am: Stare at the cottage cheese again.
10:28am: Look through the freezer for what I’m going to eat for dinner, so that I can figure out what to have before that. Decide on an Amy’s Spinach Pocket, at 280 calories. Usually eat those as a snack, not a meal.
11:32am: Tweet this
I get to eat in 28 minutes. Not that I’m obsessing or anything.
— SelfishMom (@SelfishMom) March 4, 2013
11:53am: Start washing strawberries in anticipation of noon.
12pm: Start eating strawberries the moment the clock changes to noon. Ponder the fact that it wasn’t exactly hunger that made the morning seem so long, but just the thought of food.
12:08pm: Finish eating a hard-boiled egg. Lick every grain of salt from my fingers. Still hungry. Take a Fucothin, drink a glass of water, and open another Diet Dr Pepper.
12:15pm: Realize I’m not really hungry anymore, and yet I still want to eat ALL OF THE THINGS!!!
1:07pm: Stomach just growled – hungry again already. Told it to shut up. If I eat more now I’ll regret it later.
1:30pm: Weigh an apple. Realize I can’t fit one in today unless I give something else up. Also can’t eat the hummus. Basically went to the store this morning for the five strawberries I ate at noon.
1:35pm: Consider swapping out the cottage cheese for the apple, but remember how happy dairy makes me.
1:59pm: Figure out the exact combination of light dressing and green leaf lettuce that will allow me to have a 33 calorie salad. Kill me now.
2:09pm: Mistakenly think I accidentally deleted 50 videos from my hard drive. Want pasta. Drink another Diet Dr Pepper.
2:10pm: Remember we have baby dill pickles in the fridge. Low cal, tangy, delicious pickles. Search fridge for five minutes before remembering that I finished them last month and forgot to put them on the shopping list. Idiot.
2:16pm: Add pickles to Fresh Direct order.
2:20pm: Remember that pickles are loaded with sodium and might not really be 5 calories per serving and take them off of Fresh Direct order and OMG, why is my mouth watering?
2:30pm: Remind myself that I did not get chubby eating pickles even if the calorie count is wrong and add them back to the order.
2:38pm: Tidy up kitchen. Find plastic bag that used to have garlic bread in it. Stick my head in and take a giant whiff before throwing it out.
2:45pm: Start to reconsider spinach pocket for dinner. Think about the GIANT salad – with croutons – that I could have for 280 calories. But Amy’s Spinach Pockets are soooo good.
2:50pm: Pick my daughter up from school. Don’t think about food the entire time I’m out of the house. Occurs to me that perhaps five feet from my kitchen is not the best place to work on fast days.
3:30pm: Eat my 33 calorie salad. Wonder how rabbits live like this, then remind myself that they don’t even get the two teaspoons of dressing that I have. Being a rabbit must suck ass. Take a Fucothin and drink a glass of water.
3:40pm: Feel physically full, but still want all of the food.
4:15pm: Take my daughter to dance class. Little boy sitting next to me starts to eat a baguette sandwich. I start daydreaming about what would happen if I just leaned over and took a bite.
6:04pm: Back home. Wondering if I will really make it until 7:30 when we usually have dinner. Wondering if it even makes sense to wait that long. Contemplate eating my dinner an hour before the kids eat theirs.
6:21pm: As the clock ticks closer to my last meal of the day I feel pretty good. I mean, I’m hungry, and I would eat an entire pizza if it were set in front of me. But physically, I don’t feel like I’ve only had 220 calories so far today. No lightheadedness or dizziness, not feeling sleepy, and my stomach hasn’t grumbled for hours. For some reason it gets easier as the day goes on, not harder. Or maybe I’m just delirious.
6:34pm: Open a jar of peanut butter and breath deeply for about 15 seconds.
6:42pm: Reach into freezer, take out dinner, put it back, drink a glass of water.
7:18pm: Eat the spinach pocket (actually manage to eat it slowly and enjoy it). It’s the tastiest thing EVER. Want to eat twenty. Take a Fucothin and drink a glass of water.
7:20pm: Start making the kids’ grilled cheeses. Curse them for being young and thin.
7:25pm: While putting the spinach pocket package in the recycling notice that it actually contains 260 calories, not 280. Feel like a death row inmate who has just gotten a call from the governor. Do some middle school math to figure out how many chocolate chips make up twenty calories.
7:28pm: Eat eight chocolate chips and open up a Diet Dr Pepper.
7:45pm: Clean up dinner table. Smell the leftover grilled cheese. Offer it to my husband, because grilled cheese should NEVER BE THROWN OUT! He doesn’t want it. I put it down the garbage disposal immediately. Something inside of me dies.
8:10pm: Climb into bed with my laptop to get some work done. Feel full and, considering I’m not stuffed, rather satisfied. Can still taste chocolate in my teeth. Feels good to be a couple of floors away from the kitchen.
9:51pm: Go to bed. Will get eight glorious hours of sleep tonight. A little hungry, but no more so than on a normal night when I don’t snack after dinner. Look forward to eating tomorrow.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: Food, The FastDiet, Weight Loss
When It Comes To Weight, Find What’s right For You
Oct 4, 2012 Weight Loss
Weight has been in the news a lot lately. Ralph Lauren got some publicity by hiring a size twelve model, although I hesitate to give him too big of a clap because…um…she’s gorgeous and thin and anybody who wouldn’t hire her is insane. The fact that she’s routinely referred to as “plus size” is just laughable, but I guess compared to the bony size zeros who are usually hired, she is. Well, good for her.
Lady Gaga recently professed her love of pasta and admitted to a history of eating disorders. Posing in her underwear, she asked her fans to be brave with her. Personally I don’t see the extra twenty-five pounds she said she gained – she looks fabulous and fit in the pictures – but her message is clear: love and accept yourself, and find your own balance.
An admittedly overweight news anchor recently took to her morning show to share an email from a man who told her that she wasn’t a good role model for girls because of her weight. I loved what she and her husband had to say about the weight issue, and good for her for standing up for herself against a man she’s calling a bully. (I disagree that he bullied her, but that’s a minor quibble.)
And, while not nearly as high profile as those other women, I started a weekly video diary a few weeks ago about my quest to get thinner and fitter as I head into my forties.
The theme here is that we’re all trying to find something that works for us. Forget about the dangers of being overweight for just a moment, since there’s growing evidence that how fit you are is more important than how much you weigh. Let’s just talk about what it means to be bigger, and to be called obese.
I’ve always been confused by one person telling another person that she should lose weight. Everyone is different, and has her own normal, right? And yet there are so many arbitrary measurements that push us into categories – that try to define us instead of taking our individual circumstances into account.
I am still, at 173 pounds and 5’4”, just a big spaghetti dinner away from being categorized as obese. This is a ridiculous way to classify people. I am walking and jogging several times a week with my kids, and about to start a twenty-week training program to get ready for my third half marathon. And while I don’t break any speed records, I’m getting faster each year. My goal in February is to finish in under 3 hours. I can ride my bike over the Manhattan Bridge no problem. I go up my own three flights of stairs multiple times each day. My blood pressure and cholesterol have always been excellent. And yet, the numbers on a chart classify me as being, somehow, a problem. In danger because of my weight.
I know someone with a BMI very close to mine who is training for a marathon, routinely completing long runs at a pace of 10 minutes per mile or faster. And yet she’s at the high end of the “overweight” classification. Like I said, ridiculous. So for the rest of this post, let’s forget about the words “obese” and “overweight.” They don’t mean anything when compared to how a person feels and what a person can do.
My weight has never, ever stopped me from doing something I wanted to do. I went scuba diving at 183 pounds. I remember the exact weight because I had to say it in front of a big group of people at the dive center. While I probably should have been annoyed at being asked that in public (so that the dive instructor could adjust my vest), I was already in a skin-tight wet-suit – I had nothing left to hide.
I’ve never been in danger of not fitting into an airplane seat or a movie theater chair. I’ve never not gone to a beach because I didn’t want to get in a bathing suit (I’m not saying I enjoy being in a bathing suit, just that I never didn’t go because of that). But I’m also not happy with the way I look, and when I exercise I know how much easier jogging would be with less weight to haul around. So I decided a year ago to take some weight off.
And I try hard not to judge other people for how much they weigh. I don’t know what’s going on in their lives, with their health. It’s really none of my business. But then I read things like this, and feel absolutely awful for someone who doesn’t want to appear in public because of her weight. That is not a person who has found her balance.
Is it society’s fault, for shaming people it feels aren’t acceptable? Is it this woman’s fault, for not having the confidence to walk into a room? I have no idea, but I do know two things for sure. One, that when you stop doing things because of your weight, it’s time to make a change. You are letting someone else’s agenda control your actions. Whether that change means gaining enough confidence to walk into a room when you’re fat, or deciding not to be fat anymore? Again – none of my business. But If something isn’t working, you should change it.
And two, shaming people into losing weight doesn’t work. Maybe this is something that healthy, non-emotional eaters just don’t get, but for a lot of us, telling us we’re fat sends us to the fridge. Makes us feel ugly and unworthy. It takes a lot of work to lose weight, and why in the world would a person put all that effort into herself if she doesn’t like herself? If she doesn’t think she’s worth it?
Breastfeeding or not. Staying home with the kids or going back to work. Putting your child in day care or getting a nanny. Letting your kid get a cell phone or not. Losing weight. Or not.
Telling people to do what works for them, for their families, makes for boring blog posts, boring talk shows, boring magazines. But there’s rarely a one-size-fits-all solution for anything. Find your balance. Your normal. If your weight isn’t working for you, fix it. If it is working for you, hold your head up high and tell the rest of the world that you don’t give a flying… ;-)
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
On today’s menu
Sep 27, 2012 Weight Loss
Someone over at this post just asked what I eat on one of my low-carb/low-cal days. Here’s you go. The chart below is what I’ll be eating today. It all works out to 794 calories, and 36.7 grams of carbohydrates. As you can see, I weigh and measure everything. I’ve tried many different methods, and this is what works best with my rule-following, math-loving brain.
Low-carb is hard for a vegetarian, and a plan that won’t really let me eat fruits and veg seems wrong to me. But understand that I only do this twice a week, and it makes a big difference. I eat lots of fruits and vegetables the other five days.
It also helps that I don’t have a cholesterol problem, so eating three eggs in a day is fine for me (and let’s face it, how many times have I gone to Perkins and had a three-egg omelet, for just one meal?). But on these days, I definitely have trouble getting in enough fiber, calcium, and iron (no problem with vitamins A & C though – the lettuce takes care of that). It’s hard to get in enough of most nutrients on only 800 calories. But again, two days a week only. It all averages out fine each week.
This is basically nine tiny meals. The egg, butter, milk, and sharp cheddar will be a little omelet. There are a couple of salads in there (yum) and a couple of open-faced egg salad sandwiches (double yum). A spoonful of peanut butter? Yes please! And Parmesan cheese is one of my favorite cheeses to snack on.
The key for me is that I never ever eat anything I don’t really like. I love Morningstar Farms products. I love eggs. I love cheese. I love peanut butter. I love salad. If you don’t like these things, don’t eat them! Find things that you like that work for you – there has to be something besides cake. :-)
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: Food, Weight Loss
Weight Loss 4.0
Sep 27, 2012 Weight Loss
I feel like I’m in the fourth (and final) stage of my weight loss. That might seem weird since I still have more than 30 pounds to go until I reach my goal, but I’m in a comfortable routine that is working – I don’t feel like I’m looking for “the best way” to lose weight any more.
1.0 was when I started this whole thing just under a year ago. Slim-Fast sent me some shakes and bars, and I took off the first ten pounds pretty easily. But it was really just a kick start. As delicious as the Slim-Fast stuff was, I knew I could never do it long term – I like “food” more than I like eating sweet, sugary things 4-5 times a day. I happened to interview Dr. Oz ten days in to my Slim-Fast plan, and he had some good advice for me. It would get me going, but I would need to have something else waiting in the wings for when I got tired of it. I started looking for a new plan.
2.0 was when DietBet.com offered up a big prize to me and some other bloggers for losing 4% of our body weights in 4 weeks. I did (all seven of us did, actually) and won over $700 – half of it going to a great charity, The Fistula Foundation. My method for those four weeks was simple: 1,400 calories four times a week, 700 calories/60 grams of carbs twice a week, and one day a week where I could eat anything, no calorie counting. It was based on some interesting studies, and worked really well for me. Since I largely live on carbs, two days a week of deprivation was just about the most I could do, but it was all I needed to do.
3.0 was the time between the first Diet Bet, and now. I tried a few other things. I tried dessert for breakfast, which was also based on an interesting study. I think it’s something that I’ll probably go back to if and when I ever try to just eat like a normal person, without counting calories. The science behind having something sweet with breakfast is strong. But combined with calorie counting, I found it unnecessary, and just used too many calories early in the day – the opposite of what my body wants to do.
I also tried massive amounts of exercise alongside massive amounts of eating. I actually took off five pounds this summer, while enjoying way too many meals out with my husband (the kids were at summer camp). I usually gain in the summer even without the restaurants, so I’d call that a success. But most days I simply don’t have time to exercise for two or more hours, so that’s done until the kids go away again.
Mostly, I just tried to maintain my weight loss, with little bursts of losing. But then, as I got closer to forty (it’s now four weeks away!) I got very motivated. Which brings us to…
4.0. It’s really just my 2.0 method, with a few small changes. I’m doing two days a week of low-carb/low-cal, with 800 calories this time, but only 40 grams of carbs. Four days a week of 1,200 calories, no carb counting (fewer calories than last time, because I just want to get this shit over with already!). And one day a week of whatever, although this time I’m attempting to keep it at 2,000 calories, if I’m home or easily able to count them. Not always possible, like last Saturday night in Boston when I pretty much ate myself sick at Maggiano’s. Oops. (But oh so tasty!)
I’ve also been doing a more moderate amount of exercise. Usually a six mile walk-jog once a week, a bike ride or jog here and there, some 5K training with the kids. Nothing massive or all that consistent. But I have been making a big effort to bike where I would usually take the subway. It really only works if I can show up a little sweaty. Lunch with a friend in lower Manhattan? Fine. Laser hair removal appointment near Central Park where my nether-regions will be worked on? Nope.
If I feel like I need to “eat” those exercise calories on a given day, I do. But if I’m having one of those days where I’m out of calories and just need to eat more, I put my sneakers on, log some more exercise calories, and then eat some potato chips. But when I can, I just let those exercise calories sit in the “bank.” Hopefully it’s making me lose a little faster.
It’s nice to be in a routine that I feel good about. I don’t exactly look forward to these super-low-cal days, but I don’t dread them. I’ve done them enough times that I know I won’t be screaming with hunger pains. I just eat nine or ten very small meals and look forward to the next day.
A few people have asked me why I’m torturing myself like this. If they knew me, they’d know that if it were torture, I wouldn’t do it. I like to be comfortable. But I also like not stressing out when it’s time to pack for a trip or go clothes shopping. That’s my motivation, and it’s working.
So here you go: me pointing at my shrinking belly, no constricting undergarments, four weeks to go until my birthday, 30 some odd pounds to go until my goal. Feeling great.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 1 (Slim-Fast). Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
Tags: Dessert for Breakfast, Dr. Oz, exercise, Food, Slim-Fast, Weight Loss
